


{untitled-post-col-fic}

by PostApocolypticAlien



Category: The X-Files
Genre: Dystopian, F/M, lots of bad shit happens ok, post colonisation
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-11-22
Updated: 2020-12-03
Packaged: 2021-03-10 02:34:11
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 6,974
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27676108
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PostApocolypticAlien/pseuds/PostApocolypticAlien
Summary: Season 9 canon-divergence. 2002 becomes the last documented year. The Colonists come and wreak havoc over everything that was once known and normal. From buildings being blown up to certain parts of the world not in existence anymore. When a simple patrol assignment goes wrong, Mulder finds himself bargaining his way to the top while Scully sinks lower and lower.
Relationships: Fox Mulder/Dana Scully
Comments: 4
Kudos: 17





	1. Chapter One

**Author's Note:**

> I've gone back and forth whether to publicly post this but it's me so here we are. I can't say I'm going to update this very soon, I'm really not in the position to be writing yet ANOTHER multichapter so don't get your hopes up if you like this. This just wouldn't leave my brain. This isn't really happy, it's kinda dark actually, so be warned (tbf do I ever write things that are happy?) Uhh yeah...Proceed carefully I guess? 
> 
> If and once this becomes an actual fic, I'll obviously come back and edit stuff.

Burnt bodies left in a heap, smoke still emitting from the pile.

Mulder’s stomach drops and he runs towards it. Skinner tells him to wait, make sure this isn’t an ambush but Mulder isn’t listening, his knees skid on the ground as he begins inspecting all the bodies. Their burnt beyond recognition, he has no way of knowing…

They were gone an hour on a patrol, like any other day, what the fuck happened?

Mulder stands and looks towards Skinner. He does nothing to keep the worry nor fear out of them.

“We can’t be sure she’s in there,” Skinner tells him. “They would have given them a choice.”

Mulder thinks on that for a moment. Skinner was right, they always give them a choice but what one would Scully have chosen? Death is simple; a shot to the head, execution style, quick and simple. Life is…less so. This life, anyway. Where you are taken and sold to the highest bidder to be…Mulder didn’t want to think of her like that.

He looks to the pile of bodies, maybe that would have been better.

Something shines not to far from the heap. It catches his attention and Mulder crouches back down towards the object. Half hidden in the mud, he frees it.

At the realisation of what he holds, Mulder is both relieved and terrified.

“What is that?” Skinner asks.

A gold cross, so characteristically belonging to her. The clasp is broken like somebody had yanked it from her. They wouldn’t have bothered with that if she’d chosen death. This cross was proof.

“I want to find her,” Mulder says handing the cross towards Skinner.

Skinner observes it, a hint of hesitation across his face.

“Mulder, we have no way of knowing where they’ve taken her.”

He doesn’t care. She was somewhere in the country. What was left of the country.

He takes back the cross and fashions it into a bracelet, wrapping it around his wrist.

There’s not much in terms of belongings to grab, having all he needs right now on his wrist, setting out on his search for Scully.

.:.:.:.:.:.:.

They slept through the world ending.

Limbs entangled and skin warm beneath the covers, neither one had any idea that this would be the last time they would lay in this bed, together or apart.

It turns out it was the White House blowing up that had woken him up, not that Mulder had any idea at the time. He woke with a start, a pit in his stomach as he tries to think of that the noise would’ve been: fireworks, gunshots…

But he knew then what it had been.

Scully is waking seconds behind him, yawning and asking what the noise was.

Mulder climbs out of the bed.

“What’s wrong?” Scully asks.

He doesn’t answer her, throwing on the discarded pair of sweatpants and heading into his living room to switch on the TV.

The news is on when Scully enters and she props herself up on the arm of the couch. The news displays what’s left of the White House.

“… _Is the third building to be destroyed with reports that many more are as we speak…_ ”

Miles away, Mulder picks up his phone beside him, his heart dropping when he notices the onslaught of miss calls.

“How many miss calls have you got?”

Scully searches for her cell. “I don’t know, I don’t have my phone.”

“I’ve got seventeen,” he says beginning to call Skinner back. “This is bad, Scully.”

Scully nods as the no-signal operator sounds through the phone. He rips it from his ear in a huff and tosses it beside him.

“I can’t get through to Skinner,” he says. He switches off the TV, his hands going over his face.

“So what do we do?” Scully asks, looking as worried as he feels.

Mulder stands. “Get dressed,” he tells her. “And let’s hope the Hoover Building is still standing before we get there.”

.:.:.:.:.:.:.

Night and day they’re kept in this barn, they’re feet chained to the wall. It rained hard the first night, water soaking through the gaps, within an hour they were soaked through, shivering in the cold. The floor was still damp but not so much with the rain anymore. Scully’s eyes had widen when she looked down to see a yellow-ish twinge of liquid pooling towards her. When she looked at the woman who had urinated, a tear fell down the side of her cheek and Scully had quickly looked away, pretending she hadn’t seen or heard anything.

The woman wasn’t the only one to pee. After five days of being in here, they all had done it. The tears stopped, too.

She wakes to the sound of the barn doors opening, light flooding through. The two men who took them here stand in the doorway, rifles strapped to their backs, pistols at their sides.

Most of the women assumed they were twins yet Scully knew better, after all she had investigated it once upon a time. What they really where were clones.

“Wakey, wakey, ladies!” the one in red shouts.

Their presence here was surprising. Nobody had seen the clones since their arrival. Their being here meant something was happening.

Scully’s suspicions are confirmed when the people who usually bring them food enter. Heading over to the women nearest the door they begin unlocking the chains from the wall.

“That’s right,” the red one says at the questioning and hopeful looks the women begin to show. “You’re going on an adventure.”

There’s movement all around her as the one in blue shouts for them to stand. Scully waits until her chains are have unlocked before she follows suit. Her legs shake as she stands for the first time in five days, wincing in pain as the irons move about her feet.

“Before we head off though,” the red one says from the front. “You’re going to need an inspection.”

Scully swallows. There was no secret to where they were going, what they were about to become. Everyone knew it now. Men were taken to be used for hard labour, do all the work the hybrids didn’t want to do. Women were taken to be bred. Population was dwindling, babies not surviving past the age of one. That was a concern.

Yet what this inspection was, nobody knew.

“If you pass the inspection,” the red one continues. “You’ll board the van.” He points to a green van behind him. The same one they arrived at this barn in.

“If you fail…” There’s the sound of dogs barking, at least five of them. The clone doesn’t show the dog, instead he just grins gleefully.

“We like to turn it into a game,” says the blue one. “Makes it a bit more fun.”

The clones, and the people who unlocked their chains, begin making their way down the lines that they formed. It’s unclear what they are doing at first but as each woman heads off towards the van and the men come closer to Scully’s line, she can see the way their hands disappear up skirts and down pants, the uncomfortable shifting the women do before they’re indicated to which direction to go to, does Scully realise what is happening.

And the woman beside her does, too, barely stifling a cry.

She catches Scully’s attention and as Scully looks down does she notice faint red marks on her leg.

Babies can’t be made when you’re on your period.

And as the clones approach near to Scully and the woman, Scully begins to panic, on behalf of the woman. The dogs still bark outside, waiting.

“Don’t cry,” the red one says, wiping away a tear falling down the woman’s face. His hand disappears and Scully watches in horror as realisation passes across his face. Then that realisation turns to pure joy as he removes his hand to find it covered in blood.

“It’s an unlucky day for—”

“Leave her alone!”

The words are out of Scully’s mouth before she can stop them yet she refuses to take back her statement or cover her mouth in shock. She stares the red clone down, trying not to think about what’s going to happen to her now.

The clones, men, and those remaining all turn to look at her.

“Little bitch has a mouth,” the red one proclaims. He roughly shoves the woman aside, making a beeline for Scully.

The clone grabs her, pushing her face-first into the wall. Her cheekbone collides with it, sending a bout of pain up the side of her face.

“Take that one,” the red one motions to the blue one. “I can deal with this one.”

Scully feels his fingers brush against her thighs and tries with all her strength to shake him off her.

“You’re a little fighter, too,” he says, pushing her harder against the wall. “But you see, that’s not going to help you where you’re going.”

Despite all her moving and struggling, the clone manages to get his fingers to swipe through her folds and oh does Scully want to kick him hard in the shins right now.

But she doesn’t and he backs away, disappointed.

“That’s a shame,” he says as Scully turns when she realises she isn’t being held down any longer. “Would’ve been fun to see you run.”

He grabs her by her wrists, dragging her towards the barn doors.

“She’s going on the van,” he calls to his brother. “We’ll have to warn them about her.”

And Scully is almost thrown into the van. The woman and dogs nowhere to be seen.

.:.:.:.:.:.

If you wanted to catch a monster, you had to become one yourself.

He has a vague memory of somebody telling him that once. Maybe not in so many words but that’s truly what they meant, surely.

Mulder feels that way now. His status in this new life he hasn’t taken without a reason. While thankful for the luxuries he has, it’s the people he despises and he hates the idea of the others- of her- thinking he is just like them.

And maybe he is, on the surface, by just the first glance, but underneath there is still a humanity, a care, and ultimately, an end goal.

.:.:.:.:.

“How do we know they even have her?” asks Skinner.

They sit around a fire in what was once New York City, eating their last can of beans. Mulder had been quiet most of the time. It’s been three months since she can taken, three months of searching and still not finding. There were good days and bad days. Days when his hope and belief that they will find her was strong, pulling them through, and other days where he wanted to give in, to bed down and never move, to protect Skinner and hand himself in to be a slave to this new colony.

“She’s an abductee. They must have a record of her somewhere, must know she can’t be used in their breeding programs.”

“No!” Mulder almost shouts. At that notion, at the use of that word. Breeding program. Like she’s some kind of dog in a kennel. “Then they would’ve killed her.” He looks at the cross that has dangled from his wrist for three months. “She’s still alive. I know it. Feel it.”

Most nights he lays awake trying to connect to her, trying to feel for where she is, feel what she’s feeling. Most of the time, he just ends up feeling his own anguish and pain. She’s too far away.

“When will this end, Mulder?” Skinner asks. He’s asking for his own safety, his own sanity, and for Mulder’s too.

And like in the life before, Mulder is obsessive, caught on a hook and will not leave.

“Until I find her,” he says.

He couldn’t save Samantha and he will not make the same mistake with Scully.

.:.:.:.:.:.

“Maybe we’ll get lucky.” A woman’s voice protrudes his thoughts. Lucy. His wife. Blonde and tall. He should be thankful he was given someone who looks so different to Scully.

He knows nothing about her, nothing of her life before this, even amongst the Higher there are still things forbidden to talk about, they’re thoughts and conversations listened to closely. In constant surveillance.

“Maybe this will be the night,” Lucy continues. If there’s one thing clear about Lucy is that she is desperate for a child.

“Maybe,” says Mulder.

In truth, Mulder dislikes this process just much as the girl does. It’s hard on both of them.

“I’ll let you get ready then,” Lucy says and she leaves the room.

Mulder gives himself a moment to think things through. A means to an end, is a mantra he repeats almost every day and this moment is no different.

“Send her in,” he says.

Chloe is his girl, one of the older ones, because Mulder refuses to sleep with anyone under the age of 30. She is quiet, has the same thought process as he: Get this over and done with as quick as possible.

The scars of her cheek make it seem like she’s always smiling, a sick joke. There life is nothing to smile about. He tries not to think of those same scars across Scully’s face.

He tries not to think of Scully at all. She’s always there, never fully gone. When he’s alone, he’ll talk to her, her voice glued to his mind, as familiar as his own.

But when it’s time for this, he prefers her gone.

Chloe climbs onto the bed on her hands and knees and it’s time to start.

.:.:.:.:.:.:.

He’s more fortunate than most of the other refugees they share this shelter with. They’ve lost people, children, spouses, lovers. He still has Scully, can still have some normalcy of wrapping his arms around her when he sleeps, can still quietly forget where he is when he’s loses himself in her each night. Tries not to feel guilty about it when they’re little curtain goes up, giving them minimal privacy.

He always lays against her when they finish. She once told him she didn’t mind the feeling of him crushing her. He keeps himself inside her until he can’t anymore.

“I love you,” he says every time against her skin afterwards, peppering kisses all over her collarbones.

“You say that like it’s the last time you’re ever going to say it,” she notes.

He props his chin up against her.

“I could be.”

Her hands brush through his hair and he places his head back down against her, his eyes shutting.

“No,” she gently tells him.

It was.


	2. Chapter Two

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Uhhh so this is a thing that will be getting updated I guess. Right now there's no posting scheduling going on for this so it will just be updated whenever it can be and posted about the same. I hope you like this. You're always free to let me know :)

Sunlight streams down through the bars, across her face. She tries to block the light with an arm but it’s useless. The cement ground is hard and her other arm aches with laying on it all night.

It wasn’t the first time Scully had found herself in The Box and it wouldn’t be the last.

Scully stretches, her body just about fitting the length of the small room, and pushes herself to sit up. Morning has arrived and she won’t have to wait long for somebody to unlock the doors. She’s been in here before, she knows the drill.

In the meantime, she shakes her arm back to life and wonders when it will be time to move on from this place.

.:.:.:.:.:.:.

The red clone forcefully yanks her out of the van by the chain between her handcuffs. The metal cuts against her skin and Scully bites her tongue so as not to yell out. Once upon a time, she was putting the handcuffs on.

Having been stuck in darkness for what feels like forever, the sun is too bright and Scully finds herself having to squint.

“I don’t want to hear a word from you,” the red one tells her before pushing her into the line. She stumbles slightly but quickly regains her balance, throwing daggers towards the back of the clone’s head.

With her eyes adjusted, it doesn’t take Scully long to realise where she is. There’s a drop in her stomach as she stares up at her prison. They can build a new building but the fencing and grass have all relatively stayed the same. This was once the spot The White House sat.

She’s home. She’s walked past this street, this area, multiple times. Her apartment not too far away.

It becomes too much, to be standing here like she is, anxious and afraid of what to come but she will not cry, she won’t give them that.

There’s a thought to run. It was possible. Only her hands are cuffed together, her feet free. Adrenaline will make her run faster and she knows her way around this city probably better than the clones do.

But no. Her eyes catch the guards that stand around, their hands glued to their machine guns. She might be able to run fast but not faster than they can pull the trigger.

“Are these the new ones?”

A man’s voice cuts through her thoughts. Scully looks to the front to see a man with a long face and pointy chin, his hair a yellow colour of blonde. For the most part he looks human but Scully can see the slightly larger orbital cavity.

One of them. The colonists Mulder used to talk about, that she never believed existed- that nobody believed existed- standing before her.

“They are, sir,” the blue clone pipes up. “Most of them were found hiding in the Outskirts.”

The Colonist makes his way down the line, seeming to check each woman out. When he reaches Scully he stops and Scully doesn’t have the nerve to look him in the eye anymore.

“You were supposed to bring them to me unharmed,” the Colonist shouts, sounding furious.

“We had no option but to, sir,” the red one explains. With the Colonist looking away, Scully grins, he doesn’t sound so sure of himself now. “She forced us to.”

Her grin falls quickly when the Colonist turns back to her. His hand brushes against the bruise.

“We’ll get that looked at,” he says calmly and soothingly.

And maybe it was his hand touching her that had bile rising in her throat. Or maybe because she was scared and alone and feeling that fire slowly begin to fade out that makes her bat the Colonist’s hand away and cry out.

“Don’t touch me!”

She can almost hear everyone hold their breath. The Colonist’s grey eyes turn to cold ice. Out of nowhere something heavy collides with her ribs and abdomen. A cracked rib surely as Scully falls to the ground, her torso screaming in agony, those tears she promised she wouldn’t give them coming to her eyes as she splutters and coughs.

“And let that be a lesson to you all!” she hears the Colonist shout.

Scully stays laying on the ground, clutching her ribs, trying to calm herself. She’ll kill him, she thinks. She’ll kill them all.

“Take them inside,” the Colonist instructs. “Prepare them for the Initiation Ceremony.”

There’s a trample of feet moving. Scully knows she should get up, to follow them, but if they just left her here to die she wouldn’t fight it.

“What about this one?” one of the clones ask.

“Take her to the hospital.”

.:.:.:.:.:.:.:.

Spirits were high. One of the girls was pregnant and that meant the community had a reason to celebrate.

Mulder learned quickly that being part of the Higher didn’t really mean much. He got a nice house and wasn’t a slave but the real power still resided with the colonists.

He was told they run the facilities that train the new slaves before they’re sold for auction next month. He had bought Chloe, of course. In a race against another potential buyer, Mulder had almost spent a year’s allowance on her for fear she would end up with the slimy bastard who’s reputation for owning most of the girls put on sale just so he could brutally mutilate and abuse those who didn’t give him results in the first month sent shivers down Mulder’s spine. He had won the girl and after two months with no results, it was lucky he had too.

A new month was approaching and a new auction along with it. Most of the girls auctioned off came from the facility but if a Higher grew tired of the slave they had, if she had given them a child and they wanted no more, she too would be in the mix. Every month for the past four months Mulder had gone to the auction in the hopes that maybe she would be there but it hadn’t been the case and he was beginning to lose hope she was even in California.

.:.:.:.:.:.:.

Motels and bars had become a rarity in the world now, however the odd one still stood, mainly to serve the Colonists or hybrids who might have to travel. They were dangerous for a simple human to visit, he and Scully would often avoid them for fear of capture but right now they were the best place to head if they wanted information.

Concealed by a hood, in a booth furthest to the corner, the few people occupying the bar pay him no attention. Skinner sits beside him, a beer in front of him, and when he takes a sip, his face contorts in disgust.

“Tastes like shit,” the man says, pushing the beer away.

“Keep drinking it anyway,” says Mulder. They didn’t want to draw suspicion to themselves after all.

The door to the bar opens and a weasel little man wanders in. He throws a nervous look to a man nearest the door- someone Mulder immediately recognised to be a Colonist- before his eyes dart around, landing on Mulder’s.

The little man makes a beeline for their booth, sitting himself down opposite Mulder.

“You’re Mulder, right?” the man asks.

Mulder refuses to clarify, asking, “What have you got?”

“I was told you were looking for someone called Scully.”

Mulder’s heart clenches in his chest. After all these years of searching is he really going to find what he’s looking for in one man.

“What do you know?” Skinner asks.

“Just that she gets auctioned a lot,” the man says. He keeps his voice low, his eyes constantly wandering over to the others in the bar. “That she’s trouble.”

Mulder fights to keep the grin from appearing on his face, he would expect no less from his Scully.

“Do you know where she is?”

With a clear glance towards the Colonist closest to the door, Mulder’s informant shifts forward.

“There are rumours she’s in California.”

Mulder bashes his fist on the table causing the drinks to spill and the man to jump in his seat.

“Rumours?!” Mulder shouts. A few people look their way before going back to their business. His voice quieter this time, Mulder asks, “All you can give me is rumours?”

The man is pale, scared and nervous.

“That’s- that’s all I know,” he splutters.

Clenching his jaw, Mulder sits back in his seat and shakes his head.

The door opens to enter a newcomer and the man’s face looks like he’s seen a ghost.

“I’m sorry I don’t have more,” the man says. He’s quickly standing from his seat. “Cali,” he says again as he backs away from the booth. “Go to Cali.”

Mulder was pissed. All these years and still no closer.

“I’m not following rumours,” he declares.

“You might not have a choice,” Skinner says, Mulder’s voice of reason since the disappearance of Scully. His sanity. “It’s been five years and this is the closest we’ve came. We have a location.”

Skinner was right. It may just be a rumour but it was the first utter of a location and rumours have some truth to them.

So Mulder nods, a new plan formulating in his mind. California his new destination.

“Cali,” he says agreeing. “We just have to get there.”

.:.:.:.:.:.:.

The door is unlocked and Edie stands in the doorway. She’s younger than Scully yet her hybrid-status puts her much higher position than Scully will ever be. Not that Edie sees that. Babysitting future human sex slaves was never her end goal.

“Learnt your lesson?” Edie asks.

A question she asks every time Scully ends up in The Box and each time Scully nods. They both know full well that by next time, Scully will be back in this box.

“Pack up your stuff,” Edie says as Scully climbs out the room. “You’re leaving.”

Her month is up already, Scully thinks. She hadn’t been keeping track. Days and months didn’t work like they used too, Scully doesn’t even think they call it 2002 anymore.

But this was it, she was leaving the prison. Her face scarred and her clothes consisting a multiple grey dresses. She wonders who long of a life she has left before they realise her body cannot build babies.


	3. Chapter Three

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Please feel free to leave any (within reason) comments on this. I need to inject the serotonin into my veins

The end of the road that the Hoover Building sits on his blocked off. What Mulder feared has happened, smoke fills the air. Police cars, fire trucks, and ambulances speed down towards the building, people gather around wondering what is going on. It’s the third, fourth, fifth, maybe even tenth high power building to go down.

As soon the car is parked, Scully is unbuckling her seatbelt and climbs out of the car, Mulder not too far behind her. It may be a weekend but people still work, they would’ve been working if they hadn’t decided they deserved a weekend off.

That realisation gives her pause.

In the chaos of all the people, in the police that shout and tell civilisions to back away, Scully can see a few staff have made it out but not all them.

In the thick of it, Scully spies Skinner. She sighs with relief, running towards the ambulance he sits in. His head is cut from bits of debris that fell but other than that he looks well.

“Aren’t you two glad you took the weekend off,” he says when he sees them.

The Hoover Building sits in a pile of rubble. Paper flies down. Desks and computers and other furniture sits against the bricks and metal, if Scully looks dark enough she’s sure she can see a body or ten buried beneath it all.

“It is Terrorism?” Scully asks. 9/11 only just happened the year before.

“They don’t know,” says Skinner. “There’s been reports all morning of buildings of power going down. You heard about the White House?”

Scully nods.

“We started evacuating as soon as,” Skinner continues. “We thought we’d have time then boom!”

Scully looks back towards the rubble.

“Do they know how many are dead?”

Skinner shakes his head. “But I know we didn’t get even half out.”

Another AD calls Skinner over. Mulder, who has been looking at the sky the whole time says.

“I think it’s happening, Scully.”

“What’s happening?” She’s barely listening instead staring at the place she spent more time in than she did at home.

“I think it’s beginning.”

It sinks in then what he’s saying to her. She turns to see him looking at her and she lets out a shaky breath.

“You mean the colonisation?”

He nods and looks around at the people who still linger, watching.

“Think people will listen to us now?”

.:.:.:.:.:.:.:.

He stays up all night, wondering what to do.

Scully sleeps beside him, tossing and turner. Just getting her to sleep had been a handful. A red portable radio sits in the living room and tells them each day of more destruction, more violence. Scully was worried. Tales of people taking others in just to hand them over. The word slave was being thrown around, from labour to breeder, there was no doubt in Mulder’s mind that he and Scully would be separated.

He would not turn them in.

Which begged the question of where could they go? Apartment blocks were being searched, people being dragged out and hauled into vans. They couldn’t stay here much longer.

Mulder lays down, just as confused and lost as he was two hours ago. He rolls onto his side, coming back to face with Scully. Even in her sleep she’s just as restless and puzzled as he is, her face contorting and tiny gasps exiting her open mouth.

A piece of hair has fallen across her face, absentmindedly Mulder’s fingers brush it back.

How long do they have, he wonders? How long could they run for? Was it even possible? They were able to blow up buildings from satellites Scully was adamant did not exist, surely those same satellites could follow them, track them, and thus lead the Colonist to them.

Whatever their solution was Mulder would fight for their freedom. He will not let them come complacent in this new world.

.:.:.:.:.:.:.

One by one they blow up state after state. Leaving parts or leaving none at all. They hear it unfold through radios that are still able to catch a signal.

Scully listens to their portable radio, shaking from the cold, her knees tucked towards her chest. Home is gone and they seek refuge in abandoned buildings. Their options limited, staying with people too dangerous as they risk capture, anyone looking to be in the Colonists’ good books for handing refugees over.

The radio is her access to this new world now. She listens each day to the number of humans taken prisoner. Mainly, she’s listening out for her mother’s name, her brother and sister-in-law’s, their children, her nephews but there is nothing. Names are rarely mentioned, mainly it’s just numbers, and those numbers rise higher and higher each day.

The sound of a door opens and Scully lowers the volume on the radio, grips hold of her service weapon. Rationally, she knows who it is but still as the shadow approaches she aims the gun higher, finger on the trigger, ready to pull.

“It’s me,” comes Mulder’s voice. He holds their dinner in his hands- tins.

Scully puts her gun down and lays her head against her knees again, turning the volume back up.

Mulder eyes the radio with contempt and hatred.

“Listening to the radio again?” he says as he opens the tin.

Scully says nothing.

“It’s not doing you any favours.” He grabs their bowls, pouring the cold beans into them and hands it towards Scully.

“I don’t want beans.”

“Just don’t want beans.” He sounds irritated. “Right. Would you like me to magic a chicken for you?”

Scully clutches her knees closer to her chest as his irritation makes way for anger.

“How about some bacon and eggs?” he asks, his sarcasm cutting through. “Or better, a tutti-fruity dreamsicle?”

She doesn’t answer and her silence seems to anger him more. His eyes now blazing, he picks up her bowl of beans and hurls it across the room where it shatters against the wall.

The action brings tears to Scully’s eyes, a slight whimper that has Mulder turning. Maybe it’s the way she looks; small, cold, and wet, her hair a curly, tangled mess, clothes dirty and pinned to her body that makes him regret his actions yet there is no move to comfort her. This…thing has driven a wedge between them, one that doesn’t look like it’s going anywhere any time soon.

Mulder’s eyes move from the radio to the gun. He sighs and picks up his own gun, his bag and makes his way towards the exit, his own bowl of beans left discarded on the floor.

.:.:.:.:.:.:.:.

She’s asleep when he returns, wrapped up in a sleeping bag. The radio plays static and Mulder reaches over to switch it off completely. An empty bowl of beans next to it.

She moves in her sleep, a tiny gasp escaping her open mouth. A stray hair has fallen and Mulder brushes it aside, tucking it behind her ear.

The movement wakes her.

She looks at him with eyes not fully open and Mulder smiles softly however Scully gives him an unsure look.

“It’s okay,” he whispers. “I’m okay. We’re okay.”

“Where did you go?” she croaks, rolling over, her eyes closing.

His hand combs through her hair.

“Just for a walk,” he says. “I didn’t go far.”

“Hmm…”

He knows he should apologise but apologies don’t come easy to them anymore. Sorry means it won’t happen again and they know it will happen again.

“I see you ate the beans after all,” he says with a smile.

“I got hungry…”

He lays beside her properly, not letting go of her and instead of an apology tells her.

“I will try, Scully. I’ll try to do better but please promise me you’ll stop with the radio.”

Her eyes open again, big and blue, and sad, so, so sad.

“I don’t know if I can promise that.”

He smiles again, expecting as much.

“Try for me, please?”

She looks away, her tongue comes out to lick her lips and then she looks at him and nods.

“Thank you,” he answers kissing her forehead.

They sleep wrapped up in each other and when morning comes, the radio stays off. They eat canned fruits for breakfast, pack up their stuff, and head off to their next destination, they’re relationship and little more healed.


	4. Chapter Four

Out of the hospital, a bright light shining above her, whiteness all around.

She was in that train compartment again.

Her chests constricts, breath growing shallow as she begins to helplessly move around on the table.

Figures appear above her, three identical people. A tear slips out from her eye.

“Put her to sleep,” one of the clones say.

Scully is just about to call out a ‘no’ when a cloth is pressed against her mouth.

Her last cognizant thought is _chloroform_ before the setting around her fades, her eyes closing.

.:.:.:.:.:.:.

Two weeks have passed since her initiation. Edie had promised that the pain would stop after a week but it still hurt to move her cheeks, the cut still burning and itching.

Two cuts from mouth to ear. Right now they were red and nasty with butterfly stitching keeping the tissue together. This type of cut will scar, as is its intention to mark those who are enslaved by the Colonists. Only the women, though.

These cuts on her face will scar her skin forever. Even if she ever became free, if the Resistance ever did save them, the scars, this life will always be there, people will know what she was. Scully wasn’t sure how she felt about that.

.:.:.:.:.:.:.

A sea claimed America.

Mulder sits on the edge of a cliff staring at a large Island- USA Part Two he called it- across the water.

“We’re going to need a boat,” says Skinner.

Mulder surveys the coastline beneath him. Not too far away does he spy a ferry transit boat taken from Washington State.

“That,” says Mulder pointing down.

A look of hesitation appears on Skinner’s face.

“They use that to transport slaves.”

Mulder holds both arms out towards Skinner knowing full well his former boss still carries FBI issued handcuffs.

The Colonists have clones that carry out their dirty work; rounding up refugees, transporting them. Treated as the lowest, they still held a higher standing than most humans.

Mulder, now handcuffed, is forcefully yanked out of the wagon.

“What have we got here?” This clone is the common type- bald and intimidating. Mulder frequently saw this man on many a patrol and in hiding.

“Prisoner. I’m taking him to San Francisco,” explains Skinner.

“San Francisco doesn’t exist.”

Well that was news to them. Skinner however recovers.

“Point is, he’s going there.”

The clones exchange a look before asking>

“Is he marked?”

Marked. Branded on the sole of his foot. That answer was no.

“Of course,” says Skinner.

“I think we check,” suggests another clone.

“There’s no need to,” says Skinner. “I marked him myself.”

Yet the first clone isn’t convinced.

“You’re human,” he spits.

“I have permission to transport slaves.”

The clone gets close to Skinner’s face.

“ _You_ are a slave.”

“I’m not a slave.”

The clone takes out a pistol, cocking it.

“Then die.”

“I just want to go to San Francisco.”

The clones smiles gleefully.

“You’re not going to fucking San Francisco.”

The shot rings out. Mulder yells as Skinner’s body falls to the ground.

A clone reaches for him and Mulder tries to shake him off, succeeding, yet only to be grabbed by another.

“What do you choose?” the clones asks.

In any other circumstance Mulder would choose death over enslavement yet his promise to Scully rings in his ear. Besides, this could be his only chance to California.

He bows his head hearing the vicious, joyful smirk on the clones voice.

“Get in,” he demands and Mulder is yanked by the chain between the cuffs, forced beneath the deck with fifty others, a promise to Scully on his lips.

.:.:.:.:.:.:.

Dust flies around in the air. A spotlight baring down on her. She can barely see the people sat in booths before her, a man’s voice ringing off numbers, somebody kneeling beside him measuring the width of her hips with a tape measure.

She’s about to be paid for. Sold to the man who pays the most for her. They called that prostitution in the old world yet here it’s the norm.

She’s about to be forced to make babies but they don’t understand her body cannot do that. Only once, a miracle she gave up.

Her body still carries the evidence, faint scars adorn her stomach and breasts. She had hidden her body away from Mulder, self-conscious of how it had changed to accommodate a developing child. He had kissed her scars and told her she was still beautiful.

And maybe those scars keep her alive now as a gravel sounds and shr is bought for 600 Jewels.

.:.:.:.:.:.

Mulder learned quickly how sex was now to be viewed. The aim was simply to procreate, make a baby and let it grow. It was almost animalistic, no connections to be formed, they weren’t even allowed to do it face to face.

.:.:.:.:.:.

Scully cried the first time. She had only been with Mulder since that first night when she rediscovered herself. Even when he was missing she waited, her loyalty extending past a simple work partnership. Yet now, as another man thrusts into her, as another man’s come drips out of her, she can’t help but feel she’s failed him somehow.

.:.:.:.:.:.

He hates himself everytime. For giving in, for thinking of her everytime he comes. It’s a disservice to both Chloe and Scully.

It was simple really, he wanted her. Seven years without properly hearing her or seeing her was beginning to take it’s affect.

“I’m sorry,” he says when Chloe has left the room and he sits encased by his own self loathing.

He feels arms wrap around him, a head resting against his shoulder and her voice speaking out it’s own apology.

“I’m sorry, too.”

He blinks and she is gone.

She was never there.

.:.:.:.:.:.

Her period comes as a blessing rather than a curse most days. It all stops. For a month Scully is taken out of the breeding program.

Scully fixes herself up, in a much better mood than she was earlier and pleasantly bounces down the stairs.

“It’s been five months and nothing!” the mistress cries.

“What do you want me to do?” Roger asks.

Scully pauses at the door to the drawing room. It was rude to listen but they were talking about her.

“Sell her. Put her back up for auction. Buy one that works,” Ruth is demanding.

Her happy mood dashing away at the thought of enduring a second humiliating auction, Scully slumps against the wall. She hadn’t become comfortable here by any means but it had become familiar, and despite that first night, Roger wasn’t terrible. He was kind at least. The thought of moving doesn’t sit right with her unless it was moving to freedom and that was unlikely.

“Better yet get somebody younger,” Ruth adds and that hits a nerve within Scully, causing her to frown and the feeling of being inadequate pooling in her stomach. She was passed the age of thirty-five but she definitely hadn’t reached the menopausal stage, her body still worked she just needed time.

But time had never been on Scully’s side.

.:.:.:.:.:.:.:.

“What if it happens again?”

Scully looks over the small campfire, Mulder’s voice pulling her out of her thoughts.

He looks lost in his own.

“What if what happens?”

“What if you become pregnant again?”

She notices now that he’s saying this to her stomach, as if he’s trying to see if she is pregnant at all. Without much thought, Scully wraps the blanket tighter around herself.

“I won’t,” she says curtly.

“It’s happened before,” Mulder states.

Yes it has happened before but miracles only happen once.

“Would it be a problem with I did?” Personal problem she means. Would he view her as a burden? View their baby as another mouth to feed?

“No,” comes Mulder’s voice. “But it wouldn’t be easy.”

No it wouldn’t.

The reason for his questioning puzzles her. The conversation of another child is rarely mentioned.

“Why do you ask?”

Mulder sighs. “I’ve been thinking about _him_.”

Scully purses her lips, feeling herself about to shut this conversation down. However, for some reason, she lets Mulder continue. “About where he might be, if he’s even still alive.”

William. The name of a child both parties refuse to talk about.

Scully can see the tears forming in Mulder’s eyes and stands up from her place.

Sitting down she brings him into her arms, comforting him as the tears silently fall.

“Maybe he got lucky,” she tells him.

Maybe he was okay.


End file.
